


Time's Ashes

by Marcus_S_Lazarus



Series: The Twilight Storm [12]
Category: Doctor Who, Twilight Series - All Media Types
Genre: Crossover
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-08
Updated: 2020-04-08
Packaged: 2021-03-02 02:42:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 9
Words: 19,792
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23547838
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Marcus_S_Lazarus/pseuds/Marcus_S_Lazarus
Summary: An unexpected discovery and a terrifying attack leave Bella trapped on a war-torn Earth, with only a familiar-yet-unknown old man to help her restore what should have been.
Relationships: First Doctor & Steven Taylor, Tenth Doctor & Bella Swan
Series: The Twilight Storm [12]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1694503
Kudos: 5





	1. Secrets of the Past

**Author's Note:**

> A new take on one of the first fanfics I ever read- I lost what I'd written due to a virus before I could upload anything and couldn't be bothered rewriting it until now-, this one sees Bella Swan facing her greatest challenge, as well as meeting some of the Doctor's oldest friends and enemies…

Lying on my bed in my room in the TARDIS, I stared up the ceiling, feeling overwhelmed by just how pointless my time with the Doctor had been.

Seeing Steven Taylor had been an interesting experience, and it had been fascinating to find out more about the world he'd created, but after we'd left, despite my attempts to distract myself in the library, I felt like it just reinforced for me that I wasn't a normal companion by any stretch of the imagination.

OK, so I felt like I was more willing to act on my own than I had been before I'd met the Doctor; what had I ever actually done since I'd joined him? I'd been so dependent on Edward to get anywhere when I lived in Forks, and when he'd left I'd relied on Jacob- even if I hadn't consciously realised I was relying on him- to pull me out of it; the Doctor was encouraging me to stand up for myself more, but in the end, when I looked back on what I'd done since I joined him, was I any further along?

"Bella?" the Doctor's voice said from outside my room, prompting me to sit up and walk over to the door, abandoning my train of thought; if the Doctor was coming to see me, I didn't want to appear too depressed.

"Yes?" I said as I opened the door, the Doctor standing casually outside, clearly unaware of the mental turmoil I'd been experiencing.

"We've been drifting long enough; thought I'd drop in and ask if you wanted to help me pick our next destination," the Doctor explained with a smile.

"Oh," I said, glancing down at myself to make sure I was dressed- I'd lost track of how long I'd been lying around my room, and wasn't sure if I'd even bothered to change in the first place- before I stood up and followed the Doctor back to the console room.

"Anyway," the Doctor said as we finally reached our destination, my friend moving over to the console with an elaborate flourish, "would you prefer-?"

Before the Doctor could finish his sentence, the TARDIS let out a sudden screeching sound that I'd never heard it make before, prompting the Doctor to step back and look anxiously at his ship. As we watched, a part of the console seemed to shift, various components moving aside as two small objects rose up from the console interior. They were identical in appearance, appearing to be gold bracelets with three swirled lines focused around what I assumed would be the top if they were worn around a person's wrist, but I would have known that there was more to them than the obvious due to the Doctor's haunted expression when he saw them.

"What are these?" I asked, looking curiously at the Doctor as he stared at the bracelets.

"Time Rings," the Doctor said, still looking solemnly at the strange objects.

"Time Rings?" I repeated in confusion; not only did the name not fit their size, but what they had to do with time completely eluded me…

"They were developed after I left Gallifrey the first time; these are actually fairly basic ones," the Doctor explained, turning away from the rings to look at me. "Basically, once you put them on, if you turn the control at the top- on these versions, anyway; the first one I encountered was operated by remote-, it sends you to and from a specific temporal location when you touch it and think of your destination; bit more basic than a TARDIS, but a useful means of getting about if you have a specific destination in mind and need to attend to specific business very quickly."

"Oh," I said, reaching down to pick up one of the rings.

"Bella, wait-" the Doctor began, just as I touched the Time Ring on the left. As soon as soon as my fingers made contact with it, a red light emerged from the ring, generating a thin red beam that reminded me of scanners I'd seen in films, which flashed over my body before it vanished. I was about to ask the Doctor what had happened when the nearest monitor suddenly turned on, revealing an old man with white hair hanging down around his ears looking solemnly at the screen.

" _Hello there, Bella Swan, and you, if you're there, young fellow_ ," the old man said, looking slightly amused as he spoke, something about the way the Doctor stared at the screen making it clear that he wasn't going to accept any interruption until this unexpected message had finished. " _If you're receiving this, then you are about to experience a very difficult set of events. If you wish to come through what you are about to experience intact, Miss Swan must put on the Time Ring that she has just come in contact with, and activate it when the attack begins_."

"Attack?" the Doctor and I said simultaneously.

" _The second time ring will be required for later, but Miss Swan must take it and turn the dial on the top counter-clockwise now_ ," the old man said, before moving back slightly and looking at the screen in a pointed manner, as though waiting for us to do something. With the Doctor giving me a firm stare, I simply reached out and did as I had been instructed, taking the other Time Ring and putting it in my pocket out of a lack of anything else to do with it.

" _I assume you've done that by now, mmm_?" the old man said; I didn't even realise that he'd been silent while I was putting the Time Ring away until he spoke again. " _In any case, with both of those attended to, based on what you've told me, all you need to do now is wait a little while and the reason for this will be clear. Good luck, my boy, Miss Swan_."

With that, the old man smiled at the screen before the message ended, leaving me feeling completely lost and the Doctor with a very grim expression on his face that I didn't like the look of.

"So… who was that old man?" I asked, looking over at the Doctor in confusion, hoping that he could answer the most obvious question.

"Me," the Doctor said.

"You?" I repeated, looking at the screen in confusion. "As in… you from the future-?"

"As in a past me," the Doctor said, as he looked solemnly over at me. "Actually, that was me in my original body, the body I was born- as you'd understand the term- and grew old in; got a bit mixed up about names at times, but he was always the most intellectual of us."

His eyes narrowed. "Which means that, whatever he wanted to say to you, it _had_ to be important…"

I was about to ask how the Doctor could be so sure when the TARDIS suddenly shook, followed by a loud explosion in one wall as something came crashing into the TARDIS. I had barely started to scream when I noticed that the damaged walls were already sealing themselves up- at least we probably weren't going to get pulled out of the TARDIS or something like that-, but I quickly felt a new surge of panic when I realised that the think was heading towards the Doctor.

" _Get back_!" the Doctor yelled, shoving me through a gap in the railings around the console before hitting a button on the console. Immediately a transparent barrier, the same colour as the central column, sprang up behind the railings, surrounding the console and the Doctor, leaving the strange object to strike the barrier that had now appeared between it and the Doctor. As I looked at it, I realised that it seemed to be a missile made of a strange white substance that reminded me of the walls I'd seen in some of the TARDIS's deeper corridors, consisting of a simple white pointed tube with some form of energy coming out of the back, but something about it gave me a headache just from looking directly at it…

"What is that?" I asked, turning my attention away from the missile-like thing in confusion; I didn't know what looking at it was doing to me, but I was already sure I didn't want to find out what would happen if I tried to look at it long-term.

"It's a TVM!" the Doctor yelled.

"A _what_?" I asked, looking at him in barely-contained terror; I'd already been concerned, but the obvious panic in the Doctor's manner as he identified the strange thing facing us didn't help me feel calmer. "What's-?"

"Activate the Time Ring!" the Doctor yelled, pressing himself against the console as the… whatever-it-was… continued to press against the force field surrounding it. "This must be the attack that I was talking about; use the Ring and find out what's happening!"

"But what-?" I began in confusion.

"DO IT!" the Doctor yelled at me, just as the forcefield collapsed and the thing continued towards the Doctor. With no other option left to me, I slammed my hand down on the spiralling lines in the Time Ring-

* * *

When I opened my eyes, I found myself standing on a hill, around half-way up one side, looking out at a battered, ruined city at the bottom of the hill that looked like at least half of it had been destroyed by fire damage, putting me in mind of some of the buildings I'd seen in my old textbooks on Roman history.  
  
For a moment, as I looked up at the night sky, I thought I was just on Earth in the past- the stars looked familiar, and the moon was definitely recognisable-, but then I saw three large spherical ships flying through the air, pursuing a large grey ship in a half-oval shape with wings on its back and blue lights on the side, the two exchanging fire and striking the ground below them, and quickly re-evaluated my initial thoughts.  
  
Whatever other alien invasions had happened in Earth's past and been forgotten about, I didn't think something like _that_ would have been mentioned somewhere in some form, which meant there was more going on here than me being stuck in Earth's past while something happened to the Doctor…


	2. Old/New Doctor, New/Old World

After spending a few moments trying to work out where I was without any sign of finding a useful clue in my immediate surroundings, I finally started walking down towards the village in front of me. It might be dangerous, but it wasn't like I had any other options available to me; I didn't know where I was or what I was meant to do there, but it wasn't hard to guess that the village was my best bet at getting anywhere.

The Doctor's last words to me might have been rushed, but everything he'd said suggested that he was convinced that what had just happened was connected to the Time Rings I'd discovered, which meant that, if his comments were correct, there might be some clue around here that I could use to find what had happened to what I could only presume was Earth.

Presume…

That was what it all came down to right now, when I thought about it; I couldn't do anything more than guess what that older Doctor had meant in that message he'd left in the TARDIS and hope for the best.

In all honestly, if I'd felt out of my depth before when I was thinking about my travels, it was nothing compared to what I felt like now. I didn't even know what had just happened to my TARDIS, apart from the fact that something had attacked the Doctor and Earth suddenly looked like it had been the victim of all kinds of wars. The sky looked fairly familiar to me, and I thought I recalled something about how the position of the stars in the sky varied according to the time on Earth, but I couldn't be certain how accurate that was, even if I had any confidence in my ability to use that kind of information.

As I came up to the village and began to walk through the streets, I tried not to think too much about what I was looking at. If it had been in better condition, the village could been a quaint but comfortable location in Earth's past, but as it was I didn't know when I was and had no idea what could have happened to leave it in this kind of shape, to say nothing of what this had to do with whatever had happened to the Doctor. At first I just stuck to the shadows and alleys trying to see if I could see anything anywhere that might indicate what had happened here- the alien ships I'd seen flying over the village earlier were obvious suspects, but that didn't mean they were the ones responsible-, but after I'd spent a few minutes walking with no sign of activity, I allowed myself to relax and walk at a more normal rate.

The lack of activity had been reassuring at first, but it didn't take long for it to become much less comfortable than it had been. It might mean that I wasn't in danger of being discovered, but the fact that I hadn't seen _any_ humans so far wasn't exactly comforting. Not only was it unnerving to walk through a city like this and hear no signs of activity- even in a more primitive city like this one I should still expect to hear sounds from someone, even if it was just a late-night worker or something like that-, but it seriously limited my chances of finding out what was happening if there was nobody to ask questions…

In the silence, the sound of a noise that put me in mind of Dalek weapons from further down the street immediately attracted my attention, and the subsequent sound of voices as people had some kind of argument only further reinforced my interest in what I'd just heard. Moving as quickly as possible, I hurried along the street until I came to a small alleyway between two houses that seemed to lead to the source of the voices. Pressing myself against the wall, I moved down the alley until I saw two men at the other end, my eyes widening as I recognised them both. Not only was one of them an old man in a Victorian-esque dark jacket and brown trousers with swept-back white hair that was clearly the apparently younger Doctor I'd seen on the TARDIS monitor before this happened, but the man standing beside him, with darker hair and a less lined face, dressed in, was apparently a younger version of Steven Taylor.

At least me seeing him now explained the strange expression on Steven's face when he'd been introduced to me during our last meeting; he must have remembered this meeting and briefly wondered what I was doing there before realising that I hadn't experienced this yet (Time travel was _really_ complicated; even after seeing Esme when she was still human, I hadn't realised how difficult it was to keep everything in chronological order when you didn't live your life in order any more).

"You have been seized as assets of the glorious Sontaran Empire!" an unfamiliar voice suddenly yelled, this voice coming from someone standing at the other side of the house where I was currently hiding. Taking care to remain pressed against the wall, I slowly edged my way towards the corner before peering around the edge of the wall, allowing me to take a brief look at two surprisingly short figures in dark blue armour with domed, potato-like heads.

Sontarans…

The Doctor had told me only a few stories about some of the creatures he'd encountered over the centuries, but the Sontarans were one of the alien races he'd spent more time talking about than others- a race of clones dedicated to war even when they didn't remember what had started the original conflict-, and one thing he'd mentioned about them was their weakness; if they were struck on the vent positioned on the back of their necks, they could be stunned or even knocked out…

Before I could give myself time to think about it, I grabbed a decently-sized wooden beam from the nearest ruin, raised it over my head, and charged towards the nearest Sontaran, diving behind it and striking it on the back of the neck before it could turn to aim at me; I could doubt many things about my time with the Doctor, but I couldn't doubt that it had improved my speed and balance. As the short, armoured alien fell to the ground, its fellow turned to look at me, only for the old man I'd recognised as the Doctor to raise his walking-stick and strike the other Sontaran on the vent while it was distracted. As the other alien fell to the ground, the old Doctor and Steven Taylor moved to stand above the two Sontarans, striking them each on the probic vent once more, presumably ensuring that they would remain unconscious.

"Well… thank you for your assistance, my dear-" the old man began to say, just before I ran up to the old man and hugged him enthusiastically. I was only brought back to reality when the lack of response reminded me that I was dealing with an apparently younger version of the Doctor I knew who hadn't met me yet, to say nothing of the fact that I didn't know how this Doctor would react to the hug (The Doctor had told me once that his personality changed as well as his appearance when he regenerated, but I hadn't asked for more details at the time; I wasn't going to _let_ him regenerate if I could help it).

"Uh… sorry," I said, looking awkwardly at the old man, realising how bizarre my actions must appear to him. "I just… well, it's complicated to explain…"

"Then begin as we walk, my dear," the Doctor said, looking at me with a firm expression that was nevertheless lightened by a smile.

"Starting with why you helped us like that and where everyone else is," Steven said, looking at me even as we began to walk along the streets. "You're the first human being we've seen since we arrived here; what happened?"

"Uh… I don't know," I said, looking apologetically at Steven before I looked at the elderly Doctor. "It's… well, _you_ sent me here?"

"I?" the Doctor repeated, looking at me inquiringly.

"Well… I'm pretty sure it was you, anyway; you _are_ the Doctor, right?" I said, looking awkwardly at him.

"I am," the old man replied, nodding at me before looking at me more firmly. "And you are?"

"My name's Bella Swan," I replied immediately; the Doctor might have warned me about the dangers of changing history, but I wasn't going to get anywhere without telling this younger Doctor _anything_ about me. "I… well, I travel with you in your future."

"Really?" the Doctor said, looking me over with a pointed stare before he smiled. "Well then, it is a pleasure to meet you, Miss Swan; I am the Doctor, as you know, and this is my friend, Steven Taylor."

"Nice to meet you," I said, smiling at the younger man (At least it was easier to conceal my reaction to Steven; I might have met him in the future, but he'd at least been old enough then that I could 'trick' myself into thinking the younger him was someone else without having to think too much about the temporal complexities of this whole mess).

"Same here," Steven said, smiling slightly back at me before looking at me in a more curious manner. "So… how did you get here? I mean, even if you're travelling with a future Doctor, I take it he isn't… _here_?"

"He's not," I confirmed with a nod, before rolling up my sleeve to reveal the Time Ring still attached to my wrist as I held it out in front of him. "I'm still not sure what happened, but… well, we found this in the TARDIS, along with a message from… well, from _this_ Doctor, the one we're with now… that told me to put this on and activate it, and… well, things happened, and here I am."

"And what is 'this'?" the Doctor asked, looking curiously at the bracelet-like device around my wrist.

"It's a Time Ring," I replied, briefly puzzled at his confusion before I remembered that the Doctor had told me that Time Rings were developed after he originally left Gallifrey; this Doctor must have been too young to know what they were. "From what you told me in the future, they're designed to send people to specific points in time and space once they're activated; you'd… well, from what you said in the message I watched, it sounded like you created these for me so that I could come… well, here."

"I see," the old Doctor said, looking at the bracelet for a moment before looking back at me. "Did this message tell you why you should come here?"

"Not… really…" I said, feeling the inadequacy of my statement, only be distracted by the sight of a small ship- it resembled the one I'd seen earlier flying away from the sphere-ships, except that this one was smaller and sleeker- flying back in the direction that we'd just come, a small blue object underneath it that I immediately recognised.

"The TARDIS!" the Doctor, Steven and I all yelled at once, spinning around to watch helplessly as the blue box that was our only possible point of safety in this damaged world as it vanished into the ship- I guessed that a tractor beam of some sort had been involved in whatever had just happened-, leaving us unable to do anything but stare after it.

Just when I thought I had things under control…


	3. Facing Rejection

"Oh no…" I said, looking after the vanishing ship that had just taken the TARDIS in shock, helpless to do anything more than watch as my best chance of finding what had happened to my world vanished.

Things hadn't exactly been very encouraging for me before now, but even in my darkest moments on past travels, I'd always known where the Doctor was and known that the TARDIS was safe even if it had been temporarily inaccessible; right now, I was stuck on what seemed to be a post-apocalyptic Earth, with a Doctor I didn't know and the TARDIS in enemy hands…

"Well," Steven said, looking grimly over at me, " _that_ was an unexpected turn of events."

"Hey, I didn't _know_ that was going to happen!" I said, looking at Steven in frustration.

"According to you, the Doctor sent you back here-" Steven began.

"Which merely means that I sent the message informing her that this was about to happen; it does not mean that I will have full knowledge of the situation when Miss Swan receives it," the Doctor said, looking pointedly at Steven.

"Pardon?" Steven said, looking at the Doctor in confusion. "If she travels with you in the future-?"

"If she is from the future, it may be that I have had my memories of this encounter erased in order to preserve the timeline," the Doctor explained, looking pointedly at Steven. "You have already witnessed and understood the potential consequences of changing history during our dealings with the Monk, my boy; have you not considered the risks that we may even unintentionally change history with the knowledge that we acquire of it? Young Vicki's decision to stay with Troilus was permissible due to her lack of detailed knowledge about that period of history, but if I were to become aware of too many details of my own future history during my time with Miss Swan here, who is to say how that will affect how I will react to her when we meet?"

"Oh," Steven said, eyes widening slightly in understanding. "You mean… you'd know you live to the point where you start travelling with her, so… you might not do what you did before because you think you're 'destined' to make it to his age or something like that?"

"Essentially, yes," the Doctor said, before he looked over at me. "You understand me, my dear?"

"I… think so…" I said, looking uncertainly at him. "You're saying that… the you I know didn't remember us meeting now… because you'll erase your memory of this meeting when the problem's over?"

"It is the most encouraging possibility, certainly," the Doctor said, nodding at me and giving me a brief smile before his expression became more solemn. "However, do not think that possibility permits complacency; as you have seen yourself, something has already altered our history, so we must act as though nothing is certain until we have determined the source of the change and act accordingly."

"OK," I said, nodding at the old man out of a lack of anything else I could really do at this point when faced with that news. "Uh… if it helps, before I left… future you, we were attacked by something he called a… a TVM?"

"A TVM?" the Doctor repeated, looking uncertainly at me for a moment before he shook his head. "Unfortunately, the name does not 'ring a bell', as you say; we shall have to operate on the assumption that we know nothing about the cause of this world and hope for the best."

"But… if it was caused by something attacking the future you that she was travelling with, shouldn't we assume that… well…?" Steven began, looking awkwardly at the Doctor.

"That this is because something happened to _me_?" the Doctor said, looking almost amused at the thought. "My dear boy, while I will admit that my travels have been most interesting since I met Chesterton and Miss Wright, I doubt that I am significant enough that something I will or will not do in the future could cause all this."

I thought about pointing out that the Doctor's statement was wrong- he _was_ important; just the role he played in ending the Time War alone had saved untold numbers from the Daleks-, but I stopped myself from saying anything; even if the Doctor would be erasing his memory of this once we'd restored the timeline (And we _would_ restore it; I wasn't going to let _this_ world remain any longer than I had to), nobody should have to live with the knowledge that they were going to do something that terrible…

"Anyway," Steven said, giving me the new topic I'd been hoping for, "what are we going to do now?"

"Well, considering the state of this world, we must presume that whoever took the ship knows precisely what they have acquired," the Doctor said, his expression as he looked at Steven and I. "The TARDIS should be able to withstand their attempts to gain access to it, but we must recover it as soon as possible."

"We do?" I said, looking anxiously at the Doctor. "Is there… is there a reason we need to get it back?"

"Aside from anything else, the three of us will require access to the ship if we are going to ensure our continued survival in this timeline," the Doctor said, grimly indicating our surroundings. "As you have doubtless already noticed, Miss Swan, this is not an accurate reflection of Earth's history, which means that, for the moment, the three of us are anomalies in a universe that is not our own, and we have little idea of how much time it will take for the universe to realise that the anomaly exists and take action."

"Uh…" I said, taking a moment to think about what he'd just said before a suitable interpretation came to me. "You mean… you think that, because this isn't our timeline, the universe will… reject us or something?"

"Essentially, yes," the Doctor said with a nod. "It may not be as serious as all that- we must assume that there are still _some_ humans out there whose existences may lead to your births in this timeline-, and my own presence may protect you both for a while even without your time in the TARDIS, but the TARDIS would provide the best protection."

"And we're not going to have any chance of solving this without the ship anyway," I pointed out with a slight smile. "When trying to change history back to what it should be, always best to have your own time machine, right?"

"Indubitably, Miss Swan," the Doctor replied with a smile.

"Hold on…" Steven said, looking thoughtfully at me. "Even if we don't have the TARDIS, Bella told us that she's got that… Time Ring thing; couldn't we use that-?"

"Until we know more about this situation, I would not recommend that Miss Swan activate that second Time Ring," the Doctor said firmly. "She has already been dropped into one dangerous situation with no idea what she is meant to do after arriving here; we cannot send her into another such situation on such limited information, especially when we cannot be certain where that Ring will take her, since I do not know how it works yet."

"And I'm not even sure if that would work anyway," I pointed out. "From what the Doctor told me, these things are only used to go to and from specific locations in time and space; I don't know how to change that, and I'm not even sure if it would work, since the one I used to get here appears to have run down after that trip, so the TARDIS is our best bet."

"Quite, my dear," the Doctor said, smiling at me before he looked thoughtfully after the ship that had taken the TARDIS. "However, while we are considering the changes this world has experienced, I fail to understand what the Raxicoricofallapatorians would want with Earth at this point in history; the Sontarans are a military race who may have claimed this planet for strategic value, but the Raxicoricofallapatorians have little interest in military conquest, so why would they be here of all places…?"

"Uh… can we focus on finding the ship and worry about what particular aliens are doing here later?" I said, looking apologetically at the Doctor as he turned to look at me, just as another thought occurred to me. "And… talking of this point in history, I don't suppose you can work out _when_ we are?"

"In Earth's history, you mean?" the Doctor said, looking up at the darkening sky for a moment before he nodded firmly. "Well, I didn't take note of the precise location when Steven and I left the ship, but based on the position of the stars, we appear to be in around the late twentieth century, around England."

"Oh," I said, looking at the world around me with a new sense of the scale of what we were dealing with.

I had only been to England a couple of months ago with the Doctor from my perspective- when thinking of my trip to London during that mess with the Swarm at Easter in 2008, anyway; I hadn't exactly been out and about when we were protecting Sarah from the Trickster around the same time-, and now something had turned it into _this_?

What could have remade the world I knew into this… mess…?

And what did it have to do with that 'TVM' thing that had attacked us back in the TARDIS…?

"I know that it is unnerving, my dear, but we have to focus on what matters," the Doctor said, looking firmly between Steven and I, his firm voice bringing me back to reality; this Doctor might be older, but he could manage an authoritative tone on far shorter notice than the Doctor I knew. "We shall accomplish nothing if we do not focus on the immediate priority of recovering the ship, which means that we must track that vehicle's trajectory and find where it has landed."

"You're… you think it _landed_ somewhere?" I asked, a new sense of hope filling me at that news; I'd been worried that the ship could have taken the TARDIS to a different planet rather than staying somewhere where he could at least theoretically reclaim it. "I mean, if it's alien, couldn't they have just left-?"

"The angle was all wrong for a ship that intended to break atmosphere, my dear," the Doctor said, smiling reassuringly at me before he shifted his gaze back in the direction that the ship had flown off towards. "It will take us time to get there, but since I saw it descending before it reached the horizon, I doubt that it had far to travel; we must move on to find it as quickly as possible."

"Just recover the ship?" I asked, looking uncertainly at the Doctor. "If history's been changed, shouldn't we try and find out what-?"

"The situation is exceptional, I grant you, but we must focus on the immediate practicalities of what we can accomplish," the Doctor explained. "Something has certainly happened to history to put us in this position, but until we can determine what that is, we must proceed as though this is a normal situation and regain the TARDIS as soon as possible; thinking about the other issues involved in this situation will accomplish nothing."

"And… what are the… other issues?" I asked, looking anxiously at him.

"Since we are on Earth after history has been altered, and I will apparently decide to make arrangements to send you here at some point in my future, it seems reasonable to assume that the two events are inter-connected," the Doctor explained. "Until we know otherwise, I feel that we can comfortably assume that whatever was responsible for this change in history was also responsible for the attack that you encountered in my future- the synchronicity of events cannot be a coincidence-, but we have no way of tracing what happened to me until we know where and when things changed here."

"Which means we need the TARDIS to try and track where history diverged from what's recorded in its databanks?" Steven asked.

"Precisely," the Doctor said, indicating the road ahead of us with a smile. "Shall we-?"

He was suddenly cut off mid-sentence as something grabbed him by his coat and hauled him into a nearby house, the same thing grabbing Steven and I almost simultaneously before we found ourselves lying on the floor, looking up at the tall figure that had just grabbed us.

It had been months since I'd seen something move that fast, but I would never forget what was capable of that kind of rapid motion, even if the figure in front of us didn't confirm what we were dealing with. The man himself was unfamiliar to me, and had a long, thin face with long dark hair and a haunted expression that put me in mind of Edward when he was reflecting on his past (Under any other circumstances, I would have been pleased to note that I didn't feel any pain thinking about Edward, but this wasn't the time to consider something like that), dressed in tattered but still-clean clothes with eyes in an unusual shade of orange, but his pale skin made his nature clear.

We'd just been discovered by a _vampire_ …


	4. Saved by the Vampire

"You need to stay _hidden_!" the vampire said, hissing at us in frustration. "Do you even _realise_ how lucky you are that nothing else found you after the Sontarans were taken down?"

"Excuse me?" the Doctor said, looking at the man in confusion.

"What?" I said, looking at the vampire in surprise; the idea of a vampire with eyes like that appearing concerned about humans just didn't fit anything I thought I knew about them as a species. "You're… you're not going to kill us?"

"Kill us?" Steven said, looking at me in surprise. "Why would he kill us; he just saved us?"

"He's a vampire," I clarified as I looked at my current allies.

"You know that?" the vampire said, looking at me in surprise, even as the Doctor and Steven started in surprise.

"I've… encountered some vampires before," I said, looking awkwardly at the Doctor and Steven; realistically, if Earth's history had been changed far enough in the past for these buildings to be the only thing standing, it was unlikely that any of the Cullens were even alive, but I still didn't feel comfortable discussing my ties with them after what happened last time. "So… why haven't you just fed from us already?"

"You think I don't want to?" the vampire said, looking scornfully at me. "Believe me, I would if I could, but human blood's a precious commodity these days; I'm not going to start _feeding_ on you now."

"Indeed?" the Doctor said, looking pointedly at the vampire with an authoritative stance that gave little indication how he felt about the fact that he was facing one of his species' ancient enemies. "Why is that?"

"Considering how long it's been since I fed on human blood, if I fed from you I'd probably be unable to stop, and then I'd create a situation where I'd draw attention to myself, followed by those alien bastards trying to catch me," the vampire said, looking grimly at us. "Attracting attention wouldn't get any of us anywhere; easier to just let you live rather than push myself too hard."

"So… why did you save us?" I asked, looking at him in confusion. "I mean, I'm not saying I _want_ you to, but you said that you can't feed from us here; you could… take us somewhere else and feed from us there, so why are you just… talking to us?"

"Oh, trust me," the vampire said, looking at me with a pointed glare, "on any other occasion, I would have just taken you to safety and killed you…"

"But what?" I asked, looking at the vampire curiously as he studied me in the same way, the Doctor and Steven looking apprehensively at the vampire; I knew that my relationship with the Cullens had probably had some impact on my judgement in a situation like this, but faced with a vampire whose eyes were something other than blood red, I found myself relaxing despite the obvious risks.

"But… the ties between you," the man said, looking at me and Steven in confusion as he indicated the Doctor. "The young man over there doesn't know you, but he's already considering you under his protection… the old man's curious about what you're doing here even as he trusts you, and as for you… I'm not sure what it is about your bond with the old man in particular; he's only just met you, but he already wants to protect you, you seem to regard him as a teacher, you trust him with your life but you're concerned for his future…"

"The ties between us?" I said, looking at him with a thoughtful smile as I considered what he'd said. "That's… your gift, isn't it? You can see how we're… connected?"

"You know about gifts?" the vampire said, looking at me in surprise. "You are… aware of my kind's unique abilities?"

"Well, I knew a few… others… with your kind of abilities," I explained, smiling slightly at him; even if his eyes worried me, so far he seemed to be relatively peaceful compared to what Victoria and James had been like. "One of them could sense and manipulate emotions, another could see the future based on the decisions people made, and a third could… well, he could read minds-"

"Aro?" the vampire said, his eyes widening incredulously.

"Who?" I asked, the man's shifting expression revealing that he hadn't been expecting that response.

"Nothing," the vampire said, his gaze becoming briefly more solemn before he focused on the Doctor once more. "Regardless of what your friend here knows or doesn't know, the fact remains that, whatever _you_ are, this world just isn't safe for humans any more-"

"And why is that?" I said, looking curiously at the vampire; what I was trying to do might be risky, but it was still the first chance we'd had to actually ask someone what kind of situation we had found ourselves in. "What… _happened_ here?"

"What do you mean, 'what happened here'?" the vampire repeated, looking pointedly back at me, clearly bemused at the idea that I had to ask such a question.

"I mean, what happened to the world?" I asked, looking at him in frustration. "Why is everything such a mess? Why are we not safe?"

"With Earth becoming a focal point for what seems to be every alien in this part of the galaxy?" the vampire said, looking sceptically at me. "The miracle is that it lasted this long…"

"Hold on; Earth's a _focal point_ for alien invasions?" Steven said, looking incredulously at the vampire. "You're saying… aliens coming here… that's a _regular_ thing?"

"It's been happening for years," the vampire said, looking at Steven in frustration; evidently he was wondering why anyone needed to ask that kind of question. "I admit, we probably didn't make it easier by feeding so much, but we had no reason to hold back at first, and then there was such a wide variety of aliens coming here that we revealed our presence before we learned that some things could actually kill us-"

"Hold on; are you saying that you were feeding a _lot_ before the aliens came?" I said, looking at the vampire in surprise. "But we-"

I suddenly stopped as a horrible thought occurred to me. "Oh no…"

"What?" Steven said, looking at me inquiringly. "What's wrong?"

"These vampires," I said, looking at my two new friends, "were the result of an experiment by the original vampires to create a new, stronger breed of fighters; they should have been programmed to keep their existence secret and avoid feeding too much to limit the attention they would attract to themselves, but because history was changed, we never _did_ that…"

"What?" the vampire said, looking pointedly at me. "What are you talking about?"

"Uh…" I said, suddenly realising how potentially awkward what I'd just said could be in the wrong circumstances; would anyone take kindly to learning that their entire species was meant to be programmed from the moment of creation to obey certain orders?

"Never mind," the vampire said, waving a hand dismissively at me. "Unless it has anything to do with things right now, I can't afford to worry about that; we have bigger things to concern ourselves with. Firstly-"

"We must recover our vessel," the Doctor said firmly.

"Vessel?" the vampire repeated, looking at the Doctor in confusion. "What 'vessel' would this be?"

"If you are what Miss Swan says you are," the Doctor said, looking at the vampire with a hard stare that gave no sign of how he felt about facing one of his species' ancient enemies, "then you are clearly aware that I am not like my companions, correct?"

"Quite," the vampire said, looking at the Doctor with a slight sneer in the corner of his mouth. "And if we're talking about that, I should make it clear that you're only still alive because you're clearly not interested in doing anything; I don't know _why_ these people trust you, but they fact that they do is something I can't just overlook."

"I'm sure we're all grateful for your decision, my fine fellow," the Doctor said, his slightly cooler tone the only indication that he was aware of what the man before him was and the history that race had with his own people. "The fact remains, however, that we are not going to get anywhere if your sole strategy is to keep us hidden; my friends and I may be able to do something about the condition of this planet, but only if you assist us in recovering the ship that was taken from us by the Raxicoricofallapatorians-"

"The Slitheen," the vampire said.

"Pardon?" the Doctor asked.

"The race you just mentioned are only represented here by the Slitheen, who are apparently an exiled crime family on their planet," the vampire clarified, shrugging as he looked at our confused expression. "I've overheard some things over the years, and the general consensus is that Earth's pretty much neutral territory among other alien races these days; the Slitheen have been hiding out here and trying to stake out their own specific home base because nobody with ties to Raxicoricofallapatorius has enough authority to make them leave."

"I see," the Doctor said, his eyes narrowing in disapproval before he nodded and continued speaking. "In any case, whatever has happened to this planet, if we can re-acquire our vessel from the… Slitheen, I assure you that we can do something about Earth's current situation."

As he looked thoughtfully between us, the vampire said nothing for a moment, his gaze settling on the Doctor in a cold, assessing manner, until he finally nodded.

"They believe in you," he said solemnly. "If they have that much faith in you… there has to be a reason for it."

"There is," I said, nodding firmly at the vampire. "Trust me, if anyone can help clear this whole situation up, it's the Doctor."

"You are aware that there's a lot to… 'clean up', right?" the vampire said as he looked at me.

"And the Doctor can do it all," I said firmly. "Just get us to the TARDIS, and we can take it from there."

This vampire might not be able to read my mind or emotions like Edward or Jasper, but from what he'd said about seeing relationships, so long as I was honest that might be enough to make my point.

"So… you'll help us?" Steven asked.

"Why not?" the vampire said, shrugging in a somewhat bored manner. "It might be interesting."

"That will have to do," the Doctor said, shrugging at the comment as he looked thoughtfully at the vampire; he was still slightly tense, but he seemed to accept our decision to stay with this vampire for the moment. "Now then, shall we focus on getting to that Slitheen base for now?"

The vampire and Steven both joined me in nodding in agreement, and we started walking in the direction that the TARDIS had been taken. While a part of me had to wonder what was going to happen if this vampire got hungry, at the same time I couldn't afford to worry about that; we needed to get to the TARDIS, and this vampire was the only person available strong enough to protect us from anything else that might try to attack us. So long as we avoided getting cut and giving him a reason to register our blood, everything should be all right…

"By the way," I said, looking curiously at our new bodyguard as we kept on walking. "What's your name?"

"Marcus," the vampire replied, looking grimly at me. "Just… call me Marcus."

"Marcus," I said, smiling at him, trying to ignore my nagging doubts. "I'm Bella Swan; this is Steven Taylor, and our friend is the Doctor."

Marcus's only response to learning our names was a brief, cursory nod, but this wasn't the time to criticise anyone for their manners; we had a plan, and we had to focus on that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To answer the obvious question for the 'Twilight' fans, this _is_ the Marcus who belongs to the Volturi in canon; considering his age, I felt that he was old enough to still exist in this new timeline, even if he wouldn't be in the Volturi as there was never any real interest among the vampires in establishing a ruling body, due to there being so many aliens on Earth that keeping the secret became a necessity of survival against foes who could actually kill them.


	5. The History of the World

"So… how long has Earth been like this?" I asked, looking curiously at Marcus as we continued walking. We'd remained quiet and hidden for the first hour or so of our walk, wanting to avoid the risk of being detected by any additional Sontaran forces as we remained in the city, but with the city behind us I felt that we could ask some of our immediate questions.

"You really don't know?" Marcus said, looking at me in surprise. "You know about vampires, but-"

"As the young lady has made clear, we are ignorant of the current situation on this world, my good fellow," the Doctor said, looking firmly at the vampire. "Could you please answer our questions?"

For a moment, the vampire simply looked sceptically at the group, before he nodded in resignation.

"It started in Pompeii," he began, his tone grim.

"Pompeii?" all three of us repeated in surprise.

"Pompeii," Marcus confirmed. "That was where the Pyrovile first arrived on Earth, almost two thousand years ago, expanding outwards from that point to convert some humans into smaller variations on them."

"The Pyrovile?" the Doctor repeated, looking at Marcus in surprise.

"Pyroville?" Steven and I asked virtually simultaneously.

"A silicon-based life-form from the planet Pyrovillia," the Doctor explained, looking solemnly at us. "They generally reach over ten feet in height, are capable of generating fire, and highly dangerous adversaries…"

His eyes narrowed thoughtfully as he looked at Marcus. "What were they doing on Earth at that time?"

"Attempting to establish a new homeworld," the vampire explained, a brief glare in his eyes at the memory. "We learned later on that the Sontarans had taken control of the Pyrovile homeworld at some point in the past and were using it to mount a new strategic assault against their enemies, forcing the Pyrovile to escape here and crash-land until an earthquake woke them up, but that didn't matter at the time; all that mattered was that they were here to establish a new empire, turning some humans exposed to their dust particles into a kind of Pyrovile offshoot, and we were unaware of them until it was too late."

"I see," the Doctor said with a thoughtful nod. "What happened once they went public?"

"Well, their progress was somewhat limited by their vulnerability to water- large amounts of water could at last hold them back, so they couldn't cross the sea even if they were able to expand a considerable distance over land- but even when we started trying to fight back there wasn't much that we could do to them," Marcus explained. "We were faster than the Pyrovile, but their fire was still dangerous to us, so all we could do was hit-and-run tactics to try and keep them relatively contained."

"So… they've been here since… for around nineteen hundred years?" I said, stopping myself from offering a date; history might be a complicated subject, but I was suddenly struck by the possibility that this world may not use the same calendar system of the one I know, considering that historical events that defined the calendars may not have happened here.

"That's the earliest record of alien incursion, anyway," the vampire confirmed. "The Sontarans came here around nine hundred years ago when a ship crash-landed on Earth after it was damaged, the Sontaran subsequently claiming Earth as part of their empire and going on from there. They've remained the primary controllers of Earth ever since, using humans as slaves if they used them at all, but there's always been a few additions to the picture; stone warriors led by a man who thought he was China's first emperor attacked us last century, Tibet had to deal with a mass of Yeti a few decades ago, some of us have encountered this one-eyed green thing across various points in history- no idea what they were looking for, so don't ask-, these lizard things emerged from underground cities and got slaughtered, entities described by those who saw them as pure lightning attacked us a few decades ago…"

He shook his head in grim recollection. "Some of them were driven away because the Sontarans prefer to maintain strategic control of this sector, but others remained behind and were able to earn the 'right' to territory here if they provide the Sontarans with access to certain assets."

The more that Marcus told us about this world, the more confused and horrified the Doctor seemed to become. Steven and I were shaken by what we were hearing as well, of course, but the Doctor seemed to be unable to restrain his own feelings about it. I wondered if he was aware of some of the races or threats that Marcus was talking about, but I already knew that I wasn't going to ask him what he knew; whatever it was about these stories that was affecting him, I was reluctant to put pressure on a man who only tolerated my presence because I appeared to know something about this situation.

The more I learned about this new world, the more convinced I was that my initial theory was correct; we weren't going to see any other vampires I knew because the Cullens would have only been born after history had started to change. Pompeii and the Pyrovile were obviously the earliest moment of change, but I couldn't quite bring myself to believe that it had been that simple; something about the idea that the Pyrovile just hadn't come to Earth in the history I knew just didn't feel right…

"The Sontarans work with other races?" the Doctor said, looking inquiringly at Marcus. "In my experience, they focus on simple military expansion and regard all other races as inferior; why would they work with anyone?"

"They seem to think that they're doing so well they can afford to be more lenient with anyone not already involved in their war," Marcus said. "It's not exactly something we have much of a chance to find out about; the Sontarans don't tend to talk to anyone here."

"I see," the Doctor said, looking thoughtfully at the vampire, but otherwise falling into silence as the four of us focused on waking for a while longer. I thought about breaking the quiet, but it didn't take long for me to decide against it; I wasn't sure how much I could safely talk about without risking giving the young Doctor too much information about his future, the same risk applied to Steven in case I mentioned my meeting with _his_ future self, and even if he hadn't done anything to me yet Marcus's red-tinted eyes didn't exactly encourage me to feel comfortable after what James and Laurent had nearly done to me…

"We should stop now," Marcus said, breaking the silence as he looked solemnly up at the sky. "It's getting dark, and you're at a disadvantage in those conditions; best to keep going in daylight."

"We have to recover the ship-" the Doctor began, looking indignantly at the vampire.

"The Slitheen facility is only a couple of hours' walk from here, but you're not going to be any use to anyone if you're too tired when you get there," Marcus said grimly. "If you all rest now, you'll be refreshed and ready for action when we reach the base tomorrow, and we'll have the advantage of catching them off-guard if we get there early enough; if you're serious about this attack, I think we should all try and be at our best before we go in there."

"…Good point," I said at last, nodding in acknowledgement at the vampire's point. "OK, we'll have a rest now, and then we'll go on to the Slitheen."

"Don't you-?" Steven began, looking uncertainly at the vampire.

"Vampires doesn't sleep," I clarified, looking over at Marcus with a slight smile. "So long as he's not too hungry, he'll be fine."

Nodding in agreement of my assessment, Marcus sat down on the ground and took up a guard position, staring out at the world before us, as the Doctor, Steven and I lay on the ground and tried to get comfortable.

However, it didn't take long for me to confirm that what I was attempting was virtually a lost cause; the more I learned from Marcus, the more I was left wondering what was happening here.

If nothing else, amid all these other alien invaders that Marcus had listed, why had nothing he described made reference to the Daleks? Whatever had done this had clearly had something to do with the Doctor- even if I didn't know what that was yet, it _had_ all started because something attacked the Doctor I travelled with-, so why would anything capable of attacking the Doctor like this _not_ ensure that the Daleks got a shot at Earth?


	6. Outside All Knowledge

Looking at the Slitheen facility in front of us, I stared grimly between the building we had to break into and the people I was going to break into it with.

After a night's rest that had proven far more beneficial than I'd expected- I hadn't even realised how tired I was until I woke up-, the Doctor, Steven, Marcus and I had continued our walk towards the facility where Marcus believed the TARDIS had been taken. True to Marcus's prediction, it hadn't taken long for us to reach the location once we woke up, but now we were faced with the challenge of getting into it.

As alien bases went, it was actually rather straightforward compared to some of the buildings I'd encountered with my Doctor. The walls were made of a secure-looking metal, but there were a couple of very obvious doors on the sides facing us alone, and there was a large area inside that looked like it could be either a courtyard or a spaceship landing pad from our current angle. It was surrounded on most sides by clear fields with only a few trees, but we'd managed to approach it at an angle that gave us a reasonably steep hill with a series of rock formations on it to cross before we reached our destination; it would be a tricky climb, but it gave us some cover to work with.

Given the lack of anywhere else where the ship that had taken the TARDIS could be, I was holding out hope that the second guess was correct, but I also knew that I couldn't count on that; ever since I'd found myself stuck in this world where aliens had ruled for centuries, even the Doctor wasn't exactly the constant I'd come to regard him as.

I'd always accepted the Doctor's insistence that he was a different person in each of his incarnations, but it wasn't until now that I realised just how significant the difference was between his other selves; even if I assumed that he was just a bit bitter because of his body's old age, this Doctor seemed so much more… solemn… than the one I knew…

"Very well," the Doctor said, looking back at us after studying the building. "The facility is not heavily guarded, but I feel that we cannot assume that it will remain easy to search once we gain access to the interior; once we enter, we shall need to move quickly to identify where they are keeping the ship."

"And once you get there, we leave?" Marcus asked, looking pointedly at the Doctor.

"Naturally," the Doctor replied, nodding in confirmation at Marcus. "Shall we?"

Nodding back at the Doctor, Marcus led the way down to the Slitheen base, the vampire cautiously looking around as we walked; the facility was relatively unguarded, but I didn't need my experiences with the older Doctor to know that aliens could rely on far more sophisticated security systems than cameras and other things I'd recognise.

As we finally reached the most private-looking door we could find, Marcus reached out and carefully opened the handle, listening for a moment before he looked at us with an affirming nod; opening this door hadn't tripped anything that he could detect. The Doctor leading the way, the four of us entered the corridor inside- larger than most corridors I'd seen back on Earth, but not uncomfortably so- before the Doctor opened another door that revealed what was most likely a computer of some sort.

"Perfect," he said, nodding in satisfaction as he walked up to the machine in question, turning it on and rapidly tapping away at the keyboard- larger than it would be on an Earth computer, but evidently of a format that the Doctor could understand- before he pulled up a map on the screen. "Well then, from what I understand, we are here, and the TARDIS- assuming that they did not pick up anything else that could be classified as composed of unidentified material- is here; if we-"

"Got it," Marcus said, nodding firmly as he looked at the map.

"Excuse me?" Steven said, looking at him in surprise.

"Vampires have perfect memory," I explained, guessing what Marcus meant. "Once they've seen something, they never forget it; if that's the route to the TARDIS's current location, he can take us there at once."

"Indeed?" the Doctor said, looking at Marcus with a probing expression far more intense than I'd ever seen my Doctor demonstrate. "That is a… fascinating gift."

"Depends on what I'm remembering," Marcus said grimly, before he indicated the door. "Shall we?"

Nodding in agreement, the Doctor followed Marcus out of the room, Steven and I staying close behind him as the vampire led the way through the base. The route wasn't that complicated- the hardest points were a few junction areas where various corridors met- but the sameness of it all would have confused me if I didn't have faith in Marcus's memory to be sure he knew the route that he was tracing right now.

After a few minutes of cautious walking- we occasionally halted when Marcus held up a hand, and I heard what could only be Slitheen walking along another corridor, but apparently Marcus's senses were sharper- we finally reached a door, which Marcus carefully opened to reveal what I would have normally considered a rather pleasant-looking courtyard, with grass and a couple of trees in a large walled area, if it weren't for the alien ship in one corner and the small group of Slitheen milling around the ship and the TARDIS, the distinctive blue box a short walk away from the ship. I looked over at the Doctor to ask what we should do, only to find that he was already looking promptingly at Marcus. After a moment of silent staring, Marcus turned back towards the door and charged into the courtyard, attacking the nearest Slitheen with such force that he literally punched one right through the chest before any of the others had time to react.

As I watched Marcus tear through the Slitheen between us and the TARDIS, I tried to focus on the final goal rather than what we'd have to do to get to that point; the Doctor clearly wasn't comfortable with what we had to do either, but at the same time it wasn't like there was anything else that we could do now.

When all of history was at stake, our priority had to be to get back to the TARDIS; we didn't have the time to be nice about it.

That didn't mean that it was easy to watch as Marcus literally tore the arm off one Slitheen to stab it in the eye with its own claws; they might have set up a permanent presence on an inhabited world for their own goals, but it wasn't like they'd done anything someone else hadn't done first…

As a couple of Slitheen tried to get past Marcus, he extended his arms and crashed into them both in a clothesline manoeuvre that I recognised from one of Emmett's old action movies, driving them away from the TARDIS and down a nearby corridor.

"NOW!" the Doctor yelled, Steven and I hurrying towards the ship with the Doctor close behind us- he might look his age but he was still rather sprightly for an old man- Steven reaching the ship first and practically slamming his key into the keyhole to open it. As he entered the ship, I was briefly surprised at the console room's design- where the TARDIS I travelled in looked partly organic with a console that seemed to have been assembled with various spare parts, this one appeared far more high-tech and machine-like, with pure white walls and a console that looked far more organised and regular- but the surprise quickly passed; if the Doctor could change his appearance, why shouldn't the TARDIS be just as changeable inside, even if the exterior was stuck in its current state? As the Doctor hurried in, I moved towards the door to call for Marcus, but before I could get close enough the Doctor had closed the door and set the ship in motion.

"What the-?" I said, looking at the door in shock before I turned to look indignantly at the Doctor, unable to believe that he had just left Marcus behind like that. "Why did you do that?"

"Aside from my obvious disinclination to allow a vampire access to a TARDIS, Miss Swan," the Doctor said, looking coldly at me, "there is also the simple fact that what we are attempting will result in the eradication of the world that Marcus knows; regardless of how terrible it is, can you honestly swear that he will be willing to assist us in erasing everything he knows?"

There wasn't really anything that I could say to that, so I decided not to say it.

This Doctor might be far grimmer and less forgiving than the one I knew- maybe I was prejudiced, but I couldn't imagine _my_ Doctor locking Marcus out just because he was a vampire- but I could actually see his point, at least regarding what we were planning to do now that we had the ship back. If I was the one in Marcus's position, faced with a nightmarish world where nothing mattered, but learned that the only way to save it would simultaneously undo everything I'd ever experienced and essentially erase _me_ from existence…

I couldn't honestly say that I'd go through with it; death was something I'd faced since I learned what Edward was and the implications of what I'd have to do to be with him for good, but the idea of never existing in the first place…

"So… what now?" Steven asked, looking curiously at the Doctor after a brief, apologetic glance in my direction, his evident sympathy for my position giving me a chance to think about something less disturbingly morbid than the fact that someone we'd met was going to be erased from existence once we restored reality.

"According to what Marcus told us, it would appear that the earliest point where the history of this Earth diverged from what we know occurred back at Pompeii, around the time that it was scheduled to erupt," the Doctor explained, turning his attention to the TARDIS console as he set to work. "I will confess that my control of the ship can be erratic, but if I focus on taking us backwards in time while limiting the spatial circuits to confine us to this planet, particularly with the dimensional flux existing at such a significant point of divergence, we should be able to reach the city…"

"Point of divergence?" I repeated, looking at the Doctor curiously. "You mean… you can tell when certain moments create an alternate universe?"

"Only in rare occasions, my child," the Doctor said, smiling at me as he stood up while standing alongside the console. "What you must understand is that alternate universes can be created from a wide variety of factors; while scientists of your era have used the example of universes diverging based on whether a simple toss of a coin comes up heads or tails, strictly speaking such a minor event does not cause a timeline to split in two unless absolutely necessary."

"You mean… it wouldn't create a new universe if you had to choose between having a ham or a cheese sandwich for lunch, but it would make a difference if you had the ham and contracted food poisoning from it?" Steven asked.

"A grim analogy, but essentially correct," the Doctor confirmed. "For a true divergent moment to be identified, the event must have been so significant that it is unquestionable that it would have had an impact on the world around it, but such moments are hard to define specifically. While the Kennedy assassination of 1963 is obviously a key moment in history, would the moment of divergence be when Oswald pulled the trigger, would it be when the First Lady nearly died as well, would it be when Oswald had to pass by police officers while carrying his weapon… as you can see, even when dealing with a truly significant event, there are many moments when history could branch off to form a new timeline."

I was suddenly reminded of the story that the Doctor had once told me about his role in a Victorian expedition to the moon in 1878; as he'd explained it, the actual expedition hadn't been the moment when history had the possibility to create a new timeline, with the expedition becoming a definite part of the past I knew when Queen Victoria decided to abandon lunar travel…

There was no other way to look at it; alternate histories were _complicated_.

"So… what makes you so sure that the attack on Pompeii is where it all started?" I asked, as another thought occurred to me while my mind tried to turn away from thinking about Marcus. "I mean, we're dealing with aliens from all over the universe coming to Earth when they didn't before; maybe the change happened somewhere else…"

"Earth is a landmark world in the history of the universe, Miss Swan," the Doctor informed me. "It is the planet with the most clearly-defined timeline from start to finish; if we can determine where Earth's history changed, we will be able to track the source of the disruption on a broader scale."

"Oh," I said, surprised to learn such an interesting fact about my planet. I briefly thought about asking why that was, but recalling some of the explanations I'd received from the Doctor I knew about some things we'd encountered, I decided against it; even if he was willing to answer the question, it was unlikely that I'd ever fully understand what he was talking about anyway.

With nothing else to say to the Time Lord for the moment, I simply stood with Steven and waited as the Doctor set the ship in motion, the column in the centre of the console moving simply up and down, the older-looking Doctor moving around the console at a more leisurely rate than the rapid pace I was used to seeing from the Doctor I knew…

"Just about there…" the First Doctor muttered, staring thoughtfully at the console for a moment, the central column slowing down as I heard the sound of materialisation fill the room, before he hit a lever and sent the ship in motion once again.

"What was that?" Steven asked, looking at him.

"With such a significant alteration to history, I was able to scan for temporal interference and detect a particularly significant signal that may be the source of the change," the Doctor explained, looking at us with a satisfied smile, until his eyes narrowed as he studied another screen on the console. "This is strange…"

"What is?" Steven asked.

"The signal…" the Doctor said, looking thoughtfully at the screen. "It appears as though the original moment of divergence occurred… _outside_ the universe?"

"Outside the universe?" I repeated, momentarily stuck on that concept. "But… isn't the universe… well, _everything_?"

"Essentially, yes, and at the same time, it is… more complicated than that," the Doctor said, nodding solemnly at me even as he re-set the consoles. "There are certain life-forms and locations that exist outside what we know and perceive as the universe, whether in the higher dimensions of reality or outside time and space as we perceive it altogether, but they rarely take an interest in events here; it would be like expecting us to be interested in the daily activities of plankton in particular parts of the sea…"

He shook his head thoughtfully as he studied the screen, before he looked back at Steven and I with a smile. "Still, that makes it easier, in the end; since our unknown attacker came from outside the universe, he left a trail that we can easily follow."

"As opposed to if he'd gone back to change history from some point _in_ the universe?" Steven asked, as the Doctor set the ship in motion. "I mean, I'm just guessing, but… he'd have to go back in time to change history… so if he'd gone back from some point in our original history, his departure point wouldn't exist any more?"

"Precisely," the Doctor said, tapping some other controls on a panel I didn't recognise as he moved around the console. "It also makes it easier to follow the precise path that will lead us to the party responsible; if I just modify the architectural program to remove a few of the ship's surplus rooms for additional power, cutting down some of the additional systems to focus all of our efforts on navigation…"

After a few moments of shaking as the ship continued to move, the central column moving faster than I'd ever seen it move before, until it finally came to a halt with a final shudder.

"So… we're there?" Steven asked, looking over at the Doctor.

"Wherever 'here' is, anyway," the Doctor replied, his initial smile now replaced by a grim resolution as he looked over at the door. "Everything appears to be safe outside, but we should be cautious; there is no way of knowing _what_ will be out there…"

For a moment, I hesitated at the thought of what the Doctor was describing- what could we expect to encounter if we were outside the universe itself?- but my doubts were put on hold as the Doctor opened the TARDIS door and stepped outside, Steven and I following close behind.

To my surprise, the room we emerged into bore a strong resemblance to the white TARDIS interior of the ship we'd just left, even if we were clearly not in another console room I was familiar with. This room appeared to be at least half the size of the console room we'd just left, and consisted of only a door in one wall and a control panel of some sort set up against one wall, cables coming from it to connect up to various

The room's only inhabitant was an old man dressed in long brown robes over a tweed suit with a pink shirt and a red-and-white checked bow tie, his appearance giving the impression of a fat man who had suddenly lost a great deal of weight, looking at the Doctor in horror.

" _YOU_?" he said incredulously.

"Who else would I be?" the Doctor said, curiously staring at the man before us for a moment before his expression shifted into an amused smile. "Well well… you again, old fellow?"

"You know him?" Steven said, looking at the Doctor in surprise.

"As do you, my boy," the Doctor said, his hands on his lapels as he studied the man. "This is our old acquaintance that you and Vicki have affectionately termed 'the Monk'."


	7. The Sins of the Monk

"The Monk?" I repeated, looking at the man uncertainly; I supposed that the robe he was wearing gave him a monk-like appearance, but that didn't seem enough to define him by that name…

"The _Monk_?" Steven repeated, looking incredulously between the two men. "But- but the Monk didn't look like that!"

"I regenerated since then, Mr Taylor; didn't the Doctor tell you about that?" the man who was apparently the Monk said, looking scathingly at Steven before turning to look at me. "And who are you, little girl?"

"Bella Swan," I said, glaring at the man before me. "I travel with the Doctor in the future."

"Future?" the man repeated, looking at me in surprise. "But I erased-"

He clapped his hand over his mouth, as though trying to stop himself saying what he was about to say, but the damage was done.

" _You_ did this?" I said, just as the implications of what had changed in the world hit me.

This all started when something attacked _my_ Doctor (I didn't like the possessive term, but he was the Doctor I knew best; it was the easiest way to distinguish him from the one I was currently with)… there was a distinct lack of Daleks in the new history we'd just witnessed, and the Doctor had once told me that he'd had a chance to prevent their creation and not taken it… this 'Monk' person was another Time Lord who'd been hiding outside of Time… he'd obviously been shocked at seeing the Doctor I was with at the moment…

"What did you do?" I said, my usual uncertainty forgotten as I walked up to the Monk, my mind overwhelmed by rage at the implications of what he had done.

"What did I do?" the Monk repeated, suddenly looking far less confident than he had been moments ago. "Why should I-?"

"What. Did. You. _DO_?" I repeated, grabbing the Monk by his robes and slamming him against the wall (I was surprised at how light he was; he must have lost a lot of weight when whatever happened to him happened).

"I saved Gallifrey!" the Monk yelled.

"You saved Gallifrey?" the Doctor repeated, looking sceptically at him, showing no sign that he disapproved of my attack on the other Time Lord. "And how did creating that timeline we just came from constitute saving _anything_ , old fellow?"

"What are you talking about?" the Monk said, looking at the Doctor in outraged confusion. "What I did ensured that the Daleks and the Cybermen don't even exist; are you so arrogant that you think a few lives lost on one pitiful planet because you weren't there are worth more than the lives I've _saved_?"

"You… what you did wiped out the Daleks?" Steven repeated, looking at the Monk in confusion; it was clear that the Monk had no real idea what had actually happened in the world he'd created. "What could do that?"

"What else?" the Monk said, looking over at the Doctor with a glare. "I infected _you_ with a TVM!"

"A TVM?" the Doctor repeated, looking at the Monk in horror and outrage. "You infected me with a _TVM_?"

"What?" Steven said, looking at the Doctor in confusion. "What's a TVM?"

"When I was in the Academy back on our homeworld, a TVM was regarded as one of the most dangerous temporal weapons ever conceived," the Doctor said, looking over at Steven grimly. "The name stood for Temporal Virus Missile, and served as a means of delivery for the Time Virus."

"Time virus?" I repeated in confusion, releasing my grip on the Monk and stepping back so that I could address the Doctor more directly. "What's that?"

"A truly twisted example of temporal and biological engineering," the Doctor said, his expression and tone a cold one that I had never seen the older him demonstrate no matter how bad the situation had become. "Where a normal virus infects the subject and reprograms their cells to create new virus DNA, a time virus infects and consumes the biodata and temporal energy of the subject in the present… and then travels back along their timeline to consume the temporal energy they have already used."

"It consumes temporal energy?" Steven said, clearly still confused but with a dawning horror that suggested he had a better idea where the Doctor was going with this.

"And… what happens when someone _loses_ their temporal energy?" I asked anxiously, already certain that I wouldn't like the answer.

"They cease to exist," the Doctor said, his eyes narrowing as he glared at the Monk. "Along with every action they ever committed being undone, with the infection consuming all of the victim's previous actions as it consumes their expended temporal energy in their pasts…"

"Oh my God…" I said, looking at the Monk in horror, unable to believe what I had heard. "You just erased _everything_ that the Doctor did… and you think that means you _saved_ something?"

"I-" the Monk began to protest.

"Before we get into that argument, can you explain one thing I don't understand?" Steven asked, looking grimly at the Monk. "If you infected the Doctor with this… time virus thing… why is he still here?"

"Evidently, his future selves managed to _trick_ the virus," the Monk said, shifting his glare away from me as he looked over at the Doctor in exasperation.

"Trick it?" the Doctor said, smiling slightly at the description despite the grim stare he continued to direct at the Monk. "And how would I have achieved that, mmm?"

"How else?" the Monk replied, glaring scathingly at him. "You probably sent some message back along your timeline so that you could trick the virus into thinking that it had erased you when it just… stopped at one of your regenerations or something, and now I have to deal with _you_ when I'd wrapped everything up so neatly-"

" _Neatly_!" I said incredulously. "Earth's been _conquered_ -!"

"The Daleks _don't exist any more_!" the Monk repeated, glaring at me as though I was an idiot. "Whatever has happened to your pathetic planet-!"

"Is hardly an improvement to whatever you wished to avert, _Mortimus_ ," the Doctor said, looking contemptuously at the man in the monk's robes. "Even if the Daleks do not exist, there are clearly far more alien races active on Earth than there should be, and what we have heard suggests that there are wider issues to take into consideration…"

"Talking of wider issues, that raises a question I'd like to clear up," Steven said, looking uncertainly at the Doctor. "If your future selves have been erased… why are we only just learning about this now? I mean, I can understand that history's changed because your future selves don't exist, but if they never existed, surely they'd always never exist…?"

"Time doesn't work that way, my boy," the Doctor said, looking sympathetically at his current companion. "Essentially, time is not a simple matter of there being one present timeline where everything happens in a linear fashion; contrary to what even some of my people believe, I have come to recognise that time is far more fluid than that, essentially serving as a…"

"A great big ball of wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey stuff?" I asked with a slight smile, only for my grin to falter as the Doctor turned to stare at me in a very pointed manner. "Hey, _you_ made that analogy first; I was just quoting you!"

"I will say that?" the Doctor said, sniffing slightly before he sighed and continued talking. "In any case, since time travellers such as ourselves go back and forth across time to such a degree that it is often difficult to pin us down into any chronological order from an outside perspective. As a result, when dealing with changes to history on this scale, the impact is most immediately felt by time-travellers who are 'presently'- as much as there can be a present in the circumstances described- close to the point when things were altered. At the time that the Monk here released the TVM against my future self, the effects were most keenly centred on Earth and our homeworld due to my own personal ties to those planets, with the result that you and I became aware of this change at this time as we were closest to the moment of divergence. Do you understand?"

"I… think so," Steven said, nodding uncertainly.

"Uh… sure," I said, deciding that asking for any additional information wouldn't get me anywhere.

"Excellent; that's as clear as I can make it without getting into terms you simply lack the vocabulary for me to express properly," the Doctor said, smiling briefly at us both before turning his attention back to the matter at hand as he turned to glare at the Monk. "So, my old friend, can you explain why you felt it necessary to erase me from existence?"

"Because you didn't erase the Daleks," the Monk said, glaring contemptuously at the Doctor.

"I did what?" the Doctor asked.

"That's _not_ important," I said, stepping forward to glare at the Monk.

Remembering the story that the Doctor had told me during our visit to the Kurgon Wonder, it wasn't hard to follow the Monk's reasoning; since the Doctor had failed to avert the Daleks' creation when he'd been sent to do so because he objected to the morality of what he was being asked to do, the Monk had reasoned that erasing the Doctor would prompt the Time Lords to send someone else to deal with the Daleks... someone who _wouldn't_ have the Doctor's morality when it came to annihilating an entire species before it had actually committed any crimes…

Maybe the Daleks didn't exist any more- we certainly hadn't seen them anywhere back on Earth, and a race that dangerous would probably have shown up _somewhere_ \- but I was already certain that the world that the Monk had created wasn't an improvement.

The only problem now was how to get him to change it back before he could try and convince the Doctor that what he'd done _was_ an improvement; was it really fair to put in the Doctor in a position where he'd have to choose between saving Earth and saving his own planet?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If anyone wonders at how the Doctors managed to track something going along their past, it has precedent; one short story saw the Eighth Doctor stop beings that were trying to infect his timeline by trapping them in the moment of his first regeneration after tracking their progress back along his history, so I figured that if the Eighth could do it, it's not unreasonable for the Tenth to do something similar here.


	8. The Madness of the Monk

"OK, so that explains what you did; what I need to know now is if you can change it _back_ ," I said, looking resolutely at the Monk before the Doctor could say anything else; so long as I focused on working out if there was anything we could do, I wouldn't have to spend too much time thinking about what I was doing to the Doctor's planet…

"And why should I do that?" the Monk asked.

"Because you were all about making planets better and now you've destroyed Earth at the very least?" Steven pointed out. "I may not have agreed with what you were doing, but I understood why you were _doing_ it-!"

"That means _nothing_ to me in favour of what I accomplished!" the Monk yelled, looking indignantly at Steven. "I have saved my planet-!"

"Are you certain of that?" the Doctor said, looking pointedly at the Monk. "You unleashed a powerful weapon that was forbidden by virtually everyone who ever created it-"

"Oh, trust me, you have _no idea_ what we had to resort to because you were too weak to act!" the Monk yelled, the fanaticism in his eyes giving him the appearance of greater strength despite his frail appearance. "We endured so much suffering because you took the moral high ground; I had a chance to change that-!"

The sound of a TARDIS materialising prompted us all to turn around and look at another corner of the room, the Monk's satisfied grin countered by the confusion on the Doctor and Steven's faces. For a moment, I hoped that another Doctor was about to show up and help us, but as the arriving TARDIS faded into view, it was clear that my hopes were for nothing; even if he repaired the chameleon circuit, I couldn't imagine any Doctor ever travelling in a TARDIS that looked like a large silver column with guns on the sides…

That grim opinion was only reinforced when the column's door opened and a Sontaran came out, its weapon raised and ready to fire; I knew that the Doctor liked to believe that nothing was beyond redemption, but carrying a weapon like that didn't create a good impression.

"So, you _are_ Time Lords?" the Sontaran said, aiming his weapon at us with a satisfied smirk, confirming that we were dealing with a worst-case scenario. "This _is_ unexpected…"

"Sontarans in TARDISes?" the Monk said, looking incredulously at the new arrival. "How is that-?"

"Oh, maybe because _the Doctor wasn't there to stop them now_!" I yelled, looking indignantly over at the Monk; even if I knew that I should be concerned about the Sontaran in front of us, my anger at the Monk made everything else irrelevant right now. "Honestly, how can you be such an _idiot_? You took the Doctor out of history and honestly thought you'd make it _better_?"

"I erased the Daleks-!" the Monk began.

"And I could cure cancer back on Earth; that doesn't mean I'd cure _every_ disease on the planet!" I countered (I knew that I had no actual chance of curing cancer, but my analogy was still stood). "You destroyed history because you were focused on _one part_ of the picture-!"

"SILENCE!" the Sontaran yelled, aiming its weapon at me. "Continue to talk and I shall eliminate the female!"

Swallowing anxiously at the reminder that we weren't alone in the room, I stepped back from the Monk and raised my hands in a surrendering position, glancing over to confirm that the Doctor and Steven had done the same (I wasn't that concerned about the Monk; after what he'd done, he deserved to get shot).

"So," the Sontaran said, smirking in satisfaction as it walked up towards the Doctor and the Monk. "I follow the signal of an unclaimed TARDIS, and find not one, but _two_ surviving Time Lords? I shall earn _significant_ commendation for this…"

"Surviving Time Lords?" I repeated, before Steven could say anything himself; from what the Doctor had told me about Steven after we'd met him in the future, he hadn't told any of his companions what species he was early on in his travels to make it harder for his people to find him. Considering the Monk's claims that he had eliminated the Daleks, I was struck by the need to ask the question that had just occurred to me. "What happened to the rest of them?"

"What else?" the Sontaran said, clearly proud of what he was about to reveal. "They were vanquished in the glorious victory of the Sontaran Empire over their stagnant society, when our glorious invasion was assisted by the one known as Magnus-!"

" _Magnus_?" the Doctor and the Monk said simultaneously, looking at the Sontarans in shock.

"Quite," the Sontaran said, smiling at the memory. "The fool assumed that he would gain great power if he assisted our Vardan front in staging their conquest of Gallifrey, but we naturally eliminated him once we had established our presence there; when a man has betrayed his own people for power, it is not wise to keep him around so that he could potentially betray _you_ …"

"And then you went on to kill the rest of our kind after we fought you?" the Monk said, looking incredulously at our captors. "You're _Sontarans_ -!"

"Which brings up another point I would like to inquire about," the Doctor said, looking curiously at the Sontaran. "If you possess Time Lord technology, how is it that your war continues? Surely you should have swiftly annihilated the Rutan Host if you truly acquired our power…"

"Determining the exact origin of the Rutan host is… complicated," the Sontaran said, sounding almost embarrassed at the admission. "We know where it evolved, but pinpointing precisely when it happened is another matter; also, our understanding of the technology involved is… limited…"

"In other words, you killed everyone who could have told you how to use our power before you understood what you were working with?" the Monk said, smiling slightly as he stepped forward. "If you would-?"

I cut the Monk off by grabbing the back of his robes and yanking him backwards as hard as I could. It might be an abrupt way to treat an old man, but when he was about to sell us all out to the Sontarans because of a problem he'd created, I wasn't going to give him the chance.

"What?" the Sontaran said, turning its attention towards the Monk and I, its gun trained on the old man. "What were you about to say?"

"He was just going to say… something rude; I thought you'd prefer it if I kept him quiet," I said, smiling hopefully at the Sontaran; the Doctor had mentioned once that they weren't experts at reading human body language, so I might be able to bluff my way through this. For a moment, the Sontaran glared at me as though assessing what I had said, but further conversation was interrupted when the Doctor pulled what looked like a cricket ball out of his pocket and threw it at the wall behind the Sontaran, the ball bouncing off the wall to strike the Sontaran on the probic vent on its back. As the Sontaran staggered forward, briefly stunned, Steven ran forward and grabbed the Sontaran's gun out of its hands while it was distracted, firing the weapon at the Sontaran and sending it to the ground in a useless heap, following it up by taking a knife from his pocket and plunging it into the probic vent.

"Excellent work, my boy," the Doctor said, nodding at Steven with a grim approval on his face, before he reached down and picked up the ball, studying it thoughtfully. "I wonder where I acquired this…."

"We can worry about that later," I said, looking over at the Monk with a firm glare as I indicated the downed Sontaran in front of us. "The important thing now is that you need to think about the fact that the _Sontarans_ have killed your people in this timeline? I don't call that an improvement!"

"No…" the Monk said, shaking his head as he looked at the Sontaran, clearly shaken now that his initial belief in his own victory had taken such a knock. "I… I couldn't have… my plan was-"

"Your plan was _foolish_ , Mortimus," the Doctor said, glaring at the other Time Lord. "You cannot make a single major change and assume that you can predict everything that will result! Maybe you were correct when you concluded that your actions would eliminate the Daleks, even if I cannot imagine how my non-existence could accomplish such a thing, but your focus on specifics has blinded you to the larger picture. Regardless of what you sought to accomplish, what you have achieved is the conquest of Earth and our own homeworld because you were too impatient to properly look at the consequences of your actions; are you prepared to accept _that_?"

It was slightly selfish, but I was actually grateful to learn this new information; at least now I knew that I could ask the Doctor to change history back knowing that what he was doing would save his people from a worse fate than they'd endured before.

Dying to stop the Daleks was a tragedy, but at least it was a tragedy that served a kind of purpose; in this world, they'd all been brutally conquered by a warrior race whose ambitions extended to winning a war that nobody could remember the start of, without even the Doctor's survival as some kind of positive legacy…

"How did you actually survive anyway?" I asked, looking uncertainly at the Monk, wanting to satisfy my curiosity while trying to think of the best way to phrase this without telling the Doctor too much about his future. "I mean, from what the Doctor told me about… what happened… he'd know if… well, if you were somewhere in the universe…"

"But I hid _outside_ the universe," the Monk said, smirking slightly at me, apparently glad to be talking about his success. "I took myself outside of time to plan an attack, but when I came back, it was all already over… and I spent _years_ planning how to undo what had been done…"

The smile faltered as he looked over at the unconscious Sontaran, his initial grin becoming a grim glare as he reflected on the alien's earlier words. "Only it didn't work, did it?"

"Not really," I said, looking grimly at the fallen alien. "I wouldn't be surprised if things happened earlier now."

"Things happened earlier?" Steven repeated. "What things are you talking about?"

"Things that I certainly cannot know about at this time, my boy," the Doctor said, looking firmly at Steven before he looked at Mortimus. "In any case, now that we have established what you have done, how are we going to stop it?"

"I might be able to stop it…" the Monk began hesitantly, before he stopped and sighed. "No, it would never work; there's no way I could pin down where we need to go…"

"Where we need to go?" the Doctor repeated. "And where is that, mmm?"

"We need to get back to the moment before the TVM infected your future self and… well, once we get there, I should be able to stop it," the Monk said; his expression appeared to be strangely anxious, as though he was looking for or waiting for something, but this wasn't the time to ask about that. "The only problem is that I don't have the exact coordinates…"

"You don't?" Steven said, looking at him in surprise.

"I set the TVM to find the Doctor as he was at the time I triggered it and let it do its thing; I wasn't that concerned about keeping an eye on the _exact_ moment that it happened!" the Monk said, looking

"Actually…" I said, as a sudden thought occurred to me. "I _might_ have something that can help us with that."

"You do?" the Monk said, looking at me in surprise. "And what would that be?"

"This," I said, reaching into my coat pockets and pulling out the two Time Rings that I'd received before this mess started.

"The Time Rings?" Steven said in surprise.

"Well, the first one too me to you when I needed to go there; why shouldn't the second one do the same for us now?" I pointed out, looking over at the Doctor. "From what I heard, you'll program these in your future; maybe-"

"His _future_?" the Monk said, looking sharply at me before his gaze shifted to the rings as he began to rummage through his robes. "Wait a minute…"

As we watched, the Monk removed two other Time Rings from pockets somewhere in his robes, holding them up in front of him as he walked solemnly towards me, both Rings in his hands, my own arms extending out almost on automatic…

When the two rings were only a few centimetres apart, a spark jumped between them, prompting the Monk and I to jump back in surprise as I tightened my grip on the Rings; as confusing as this was, I didn't want to damage my only remaining links to my Doctor.

"What does that mean?" I asked, holding the Time Rings close to me as I looked uncertainly at the Monk.

"It means," the Monk said, his expression thoughtful as he looked between the Rings in his hands and the ones in mine, "that what we have here are not four different Time Rings… but two Time Rings, twice over…"

"Come again?" Steven said, looking at the two of us in surprise. "You mean… you'll acquire Bella's Time Rings in her future?"

"Unlikely, my boy," the Doctor said, smiling thoughtfully as he took the Time Rings from the Monk. "Unless I miss my guess, what our old associate here has in his possession are Miss Swan's Time Rings… in their _past_ …"

"Most likely," the Monk said, looking thoughtfully between his rings and my rings- I supposed I should be grateful that there apparently wasn't a risk of that _Timecop_ effect where the same thing merged with its past/future self if they were in the same time zone- before he turned his attention back to me. "Which one brought you to these two?"

"Uh… this one," I said, holding up the ring that had taken me from my TARDIS to the world where I'd met this Doctor and Steven.

"Right," the Monk said, taking the other Time Ring and examining it for a moment before he smiled. "Well, if I'm perceiving this correctly, it _looks_ like it's set for a suitable time-frame…"

"You know how to set these things?" the Doctor asked.

"I _am_ from your future, Doctor; I picked up quite a few little tricks over the centuries," the Monk said, smiling briefly at the old man before the Doctor's firm stare prompted him to shift to a more awkward expression. "Yes… well… let's get going, shall we?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To those wanting to know, Magnus was the original name of the Time Lord we know as the War Chief from "The War Games"; if the Doctor never existed, certain events that led to the Master going evil may never have happened, the Monk wouldn't have any reason to try and conquer Gallifrey, and the Rani had no real interest in attacking the Time Lords so long as they left her alone, so the War Chief seemed like the most appropriate candidate


	9. Curing the Virus

Standing in the control room of the Monk's TARDIS, I wondered if I should be impressed at the sight. It might appear to be more high-tech than the console room I was familiar with, but since it just looked like the console room of the Doctor I was currently with, it probably wasn't actually that much more advanced.

However, it was hard to be sure just how advanced it was, as parts of the console looked like they'd been practically ripped apart for some reason or another, cables hanging out and various controls removed.

"What happened here?" Steven said, looking at the console in shock.

"What else?" the Doctor said, looking critically at the console before he turned to the Monk. "You cannibalised your own ship to try and create whatever you needed to dispatch the TVM, didn't you, mmm?"

"Among… other things," the Monk said, looking pointedly at him. "Our last couple of encounters were… well, they weren't exactly relaxing for me; let's leave it at that."

"I see," the Doctor said, a critical expression on his face as he looked at the Monk before he turned his attention back to the console. "In any case, from what I can see, nothing here should prevent the ship from moving; with the coordinates we shall hopefully acquire from Miss Swan's second Time Ring, what we have should be enough.

"Should we be doing this?" I asked, looking uncertainly at the Doctor. "I mean, we have _your_ TARDIS-"

"Which is not the best at precision travel at this time, Miss Swan," the Doctor said, actually looking slightly ashamed at the confession. "Mortimus has done a great deal to this TARDIS, but its dematerialisation circuit still appears to be intact; as well as this, we must consider the possibility that these Time Rings may not be compatible with my vessel, whereas this ship is newer and therefore more compatible."

"But… can we trust him?" Steven asked, looking anxiously at the Doctor. "I mean, he was trying to erase you from _history_ -!"

"And he has witnessed in great detail the consequences of that assault; he will not attempt such a strategy again any time soon," the Doctor said confidently, before he turned to look at the Monk. "Will you, my good fellow?"

"No," the Monk said, a bitter edge to his voice as he looked up at the Doctor, evidently wishing that he could give another answer; no matter what he had learned, it had to be tough to acknowledge that his attempt to save his planet had failed...

The moment passed as he turned back to the console, putting a few panels back into place before he turned around and looked at me as he stood over another exposed console. "Can I have your Time Ring now?"

Nodding in understanding, I reached into my pocket and pulled out the currently-unused Time Ring, holding it out to the Monk. Nodding in acceptance, he turned back to the console and pulled out a few wires, stripping off the covering material before tying them around the bracelet part of the ring. A couple of metal clips were also attached to the circular object at the top of the Time Ring before the Monk stood back, taking a deep breath as he studied the assembly in front of him before he looked back at the Doctor.

"Let's get on with this," he said.

"About that… what are we going to do when we _get_ there?" Steven asked. "Even if we're right and this takes us back to… well, to Bella's Doctor…"

"I can shut the TVM down when I'm in proximity to it," the Monk said grimly. "We have to try; whatever I wanted to erase, _that_ is worse."

"Let us be off, then," the Doctor said, a briefly distasteful look on his face as he glanced at the Monk. "On… silent running, I believe."

"Silent running?" I asked.

"You are, I presume, familiar with the noise the Ship makes when it arrives and departs from our destinations?" the Doctor asked, looking over at me until I nodded in response. "'Silent running' refers to the ship materialising in a manner where it will not make that noise; considering that our goal is unknown, it would be best to avoid attracting attention to ourselves until we must."

"But… if the ship doesn't _have_ to make the noise, why do you always let it happen?" Steven asked, looking curiously at the Doctor.

"I like it," the Doctor replied, with a slightly childish smile that looked more like something I'd see on 'my' Doctor than anything he'd done so far.

Somehow, it was that moment that really helped me see that this Doctor was younger than the one I knew; he just seemed so… light-hearted about it all…

"We're here," the Monk said, looking up at us with an urgency in his manner before he hurried towards the door to the outside world, the three of us close behind him.

As we emerged from the Monk's ship, I nearly wept at the sight that greeted me; the TARDS console room that I was familiar with, coral-like columns and cobbled-together console and all, the Doctor I travelled with at the heart of it…

Then my eyes fell on the sight of me disappearing from one corner of the room as the TVM broke through the forcefield around the console, and my priorities shifted back to the present; what could the Monk do to stop it now-?

Before I'd even finished my thought, or the older-looking Doctor and Steven could do anything themselves, the Monk's hands and face began to glow as he literally dived between my Doctor and the TVM, the missile striking him as golden energy suddenly erupted from his body. The two Doctors, Steven and I could only watch as the small missile that had been about to strike my Doctor moments ago exploded in front of the Monk as he fell to the floor, his face shifting underneath the glow as though it was being re-moulded from the inside as the TVM seemed to put itself back together and explode before repeating the cycle all over again, hovering over his chest…

After a few seconds of this strange loop, the glow finally ceased as the TVM dropped to the ground, the energy outburst at its back having ceased, followed by a withered husk in the Monk's robes that looked as though it would collapse if we touched it.

"Bella?" the Doctor said, looking uncertainly at me after a moment's silence. "What-?"

Ignoring my usual shyness as his words broke the spell that had settled over the console room, I ran over to the Doctor I knew best and wrapped my arms around him, pressing my ear to his chest to listen to his reassuring heartsbeats.

We'd just witnessed the worst possible world anyone could experience, and I would need some time to work out how to feel about seeing a man apparently kill himself right in front fo me, but the Doctor was back now…

"What… what just happened?" Steven asked, looking uncertainly at his Doctor, his voice apparently reminding 'my' Doctor of what else had just happened.

"Was that… _Mortimus_?" the Doctor I travelled with asked, stepping away from me to look incredulously at his younger self; I wasn't sure if he was more stunned at the sight of the other Time Lord or at the fact that his original self was here in the first place.

"Indeed it was," the older-looking Doctor said, smiling at his future self before he looked back at Steven. "And to answer _your_ question, my boy, it would appear that Mortimus intercepted the TVM while simultaneously triggering all of his remaining regenerations at once; the release of temporal energy as he changed would have convinced the virus that it was consuming his past without it ever actually travelling there, thus preserving his past at the cost of... well, at the cost of his own life."

"Regenerations… that's the… _thing_ that allows you to turn into him?" Steven asked, indicating the Doctor that I was currently standing beside, clearly trying to think of something aside from the fact that an enemy had just died for us (Could we really feel sorry about a man dying like that when he made the original mistake?).

"Yeah, that's-" I began.

"A _TVM_?" the Doctor interjected, looking incredulously between his younger self and the Monk's corpse, as though he'd only just caught up with what had been said earlier. "Are you saying… Mortimus unleashed a _TVM_ on me?"

"Apparently so, my boy," the Doctor replied, smiling at the seemingly younger man. "Fortunately, our intervening selves would have apparently been able to trick the virus into believing that my regeneration was our actual moment of birth, preserving me amid the chaos that resulted from Mortimus's ill-thought actions long enough for Miss Swan to help us learn what had happened, accompany us back to the TARDIS, and from there allow us to find Mortimus's location."

"I didn't do very much…" I said, suddenly feeling embarrassed as the two Doctors looked at me with proud smiles.

"Don't belittle yourself, Bella," the Doctor said, smiling at me. "You went on the kind of journey that few people could have coped with; you were up against some pretty stiff odds, after all…"

For a moment, I was lost in thought at that statement, unsure how to react to the Doctor's praise, but the silence was broken at the sound of something seemingly collapsing behind us. Looking around, I was shocked to see the column that had been the Monk's TARDIS literally dissolving right in front of us, the familiar police box appearing from what I could only think of as sludge as the column fell apart like melting plastic to reveal the elderly Doctor's TARDIS.

"What?" Steven and I said, briefly stunned at what had just happened before we looked back at the two Doctors, who were looking at the younger Doctor's TARDIS with grim expressions.

"You… know what happened, don't you?" I said, as I looked back at the two Time Lords.

"The Monk had already done a great deal to its components to assemble the TVM," the elder-looking Doctor explained, shaking his head slightly as he looked at where the ship had been. "With his death, not to mention the amount of power it expended in getting us here…"

"It… ran out of power?" Steven asked, looking at the place where the Monk's TARDIS had been in surprise. "They can do that?"

"Depending on a variety of factors, yes," the younger-looking Doctor confirmed. "I've fitted this one with a few back-ups over the years- one near-miss with a lack of Zeiton-7 was enough for me- but evidently Mortimus either didn't bother or they all ran out."

"Most likely it was a combination of both," the past Doctor commented. "He had clearly been forced to scavenge components from his own ship to create the TVM he attempted to use against you; add in the complexities of taking us here on his own, and it is likely that his ship simply lacked the power to do anything else but collapse."

"Probably for the best, anyway," the Doctor said, smiling as he reached over to pat the TARDIS on the console. "The old girl's tempting enough a prize to other people when I'm in regular control of her; I've no idea what I'd do with Mortimus's ship if I had to take care of it as well."

"Mmm?" the older-looking Doctor said, looking at his future self with a thoughtful stare before he sighed. "I suspect that this relates to one of those details of our future I should not know?"

"Yes," the Doctor replied.

"Well, if I must live in ignorance, I must ask one minor question," the older Doctor said, reaching into his pocket and pulling out the cricket-ball he'd used against the Sontaran earlier. "Where did I acquire this?"

"Oh, that must be something you picked up from our TARDIS," the Doctor said with a smile.

"Our TARDIS?" the other Doctor repeated in confusion.

"You had a brief run-in with our fifth self a short while back in your timeline; he had a thing for the game and must have picked it up while you were alone there," the Doctor I travelled with explained, smiling at his other self. "It was… well, an interesting experience, anyway."

"I see," the elderly Doctor said, nodding thoughtfully before he reached down and picked up the Time Rings lying near the Monk's robes, looking back at my Doctor and I with a solemn smile. "Well then, I suppose I'd better get on with programming these things before I erase my memory, mmm?"

"Probably a good idea, yeah," the Doctor said, holding out a hand to smile at him. "Good to see you again, Doctor."

"Always an… interesting experience, my boy," the elderly Doctor said, smiling briefly at his older self before he looked over at me. "And it was a pleasure to meet you, Miss Swan; I look forward to spending more time with you when I become him."

"You're… you're welcome," I said with an awkward smile.

"And Steven Taylor," the Doctor said, grinning at his old companion. "Always a pleasure to see old friends."

"Uh… the same," Steven said, smiling awkwardly at my Doctor before he looked over at me. "And… good to meet you too, Bella."

"Hey, we're companions," I said, smiling at him in understanding as I shook his hand. "We might not spend much time together, but it's always good to meet someone else who's been through this wild ride."

"Yes it's… quite an experience," Steven said awkwardly, before he turned his attention back to the Doctor he'd come here with. "So… reality's back to normal now?"

"Oh, most assuredly it is, my boy," the elder Doctor said with an understanding smile. "However, we have to depart from this location promptly if we wish to avoid any negative consequences of this experience; having our version of the ship remain inside its future self would be dangerous if allowed to continue for long."

"Right… that… makes sense," Steven said, nodding uncertainly at the Doctor I knew before he smiled at me as he turned back towards the other TARDIS.

"Well, I must be off," the elder-looking Doctor said, smiling at me before he shook his future self's hand once again. "Goodbye, my boy; it was… interesting to meet me."

"Always a pleasure to see me too," the Doctor replied, returning the handshake before his other self walked back into the ship. After a moment's waiting, the younger TARDIS vanished from the interior of its younger self, leaving the Doctor and I alone in the ship once again, exchanging smiles at the thought of what had just happened.

I'd dealt with a lot since I'd learned what Edward was, but this was the first time I felt like I'd done something _really_ important…

"So…" I asked, looking uncertainly over at the Doctor after the silence became less comfortable, indicating where the younger TARDIS had been. "Do you…?"

"Remember what just happened to you from his perspective?" the Doctor finished for me with an understanding smile as he indicated where the younger TARDIS had been moments ago. "I do _now_ , but I didn't before now; whenever I meet myself, the younger me's memories are automatically erased until I've caught up with the oldest version of us involved in the crisis. The Time Lords did it themselves a couple of times, but we soon learned that they fitted a retroactive memory-lock in the TARDIS when I did it too often; best way to keep the timelines straight-"

"Hold on; you've met yourself _before_?" I said, unable to stop myself; the idea of talking with yourself when you were younger went against so many things I'd read about time travel…

"Only ever happens in the gravest of emergencies, and you naturally hope it won't ever get that bad, so I never mentioned it," the Doctor explained. "Dealing with one of the founders of Time Lord society, investigating a secret from Gallifrey's past, saving a younger version of myself from a dangerous geneticist, stopping a race of beings who feed on changes in history, stopping an alternate timeline replacing our own… things like that, you know."

"Ah," I said, nodding in understanding. "That… _does_ sound difficult."

For a moment, we returned to silence, until I looked back at the pile of sludge and the ash-covered robes that were the only things that remained of what might have been the only other Time Lord left. "I'm… I'm sorry about Mortimus."

"Don't be," the Doctor said, looking grimly at his body. "The last time I saw the Monk, he helped the Daleks invade Earth and was indirectly responsible for the deaths of two of my companions and my great-grandson; it sucks that he went to these lengths just to kill me, but I can't exactly regret him dying."

"Oh my- your _what_?" I said, cursing my unintentional rudeness even as I knew I couldn't take back what I'd just said.

The Doctor had had a _great_ -grandson?

Meaning that he'd had a grandchild?

Meaning that he'd been a _father_?

"It was… a long time ago," the Doctor said, before he sighed and looked at me with a casual shrug. "Anyway, now that we've dealt with that, how about a break on the Eye of Orion before we get back to travelling around wherever we want to go?"

I recognised evasive behaviour when I saw it, but considering that I was essentially asking the Doctor to talk about the deaths of his own children, I decided that this wasn't the time to press the issue; we had dealt with Mortimus's attempt to erase the Doctor from history, I had met the Doctor's original self, and that was that.

The only thing I was left wondering now was what happened to Marcus in _this_ timeline, now that we'd restored it…


End file.
